Only With Your Consent Can I Win
by Diary
Summary: Warning: Contains suicidal intent, self-harm, mentions of incest, and deliberate values dissonance in regards to many issues. All she has is a brother who will barely look her in the eyes and a sister-in-law who has all his love. She's gone from a dearest friend to a controllable inconvenience. Complete.


Disclaimer: I do not own Rome.

Warning: Contains suicidal intent, self-harm, mentions of incest, and deliberate values dissonance in regards to many issues.

* * *

Their mother is dead, and she is tied to her brother's bed, nothing but a controllable inconvenience.

Perfect little wife Livia had found her, trying to make beautiful cuts on her ugly skin, and had immediately had a slave go fetch him. Never mind that he's the emperor now, a demigod. Oh, no. He'll always come when his perfect wife calls.

His eyes hadn't changed. A simple sigh, not even of true annoyance, and he'd had the knife wrestled away, ordering her restrained. Female slaves tend to her, forcing her to eat and cleaning her cuts, fanning her and covering her depending on the temperature, and she's briefly untied but still heavily guarded when she must empty herself and bathe. He tells her that once the cuts are healed, she'll be given another chance not to be so foolish.

It's funny in a sadistic way that isn't funny at all. They both know that if there was a god or goddess of fools, she would be its greatest follower.

One day, she starts screaming and won't stop until she's gagged. 'Close your eyes when you are ready to talk rationally,' he tells her, curious eyes looking down on her.

She does, and the gag is removed.

It's boring and lonely; she wants someone to talk to. She wants to feed her birds and admire the flowers.

Flowers and birds are brought into the room, though, she's still not allowed away from the bed for more than a few minutes at a time, and Livia takes to reading her comedies and stories filled with action, the type of writing she preferred in her youth. One day, she bangs her head down on the pillow and snaps that she wants love poems and philosophy.

Livia's expression is briefly wary, but she simply nods and says, 'As you wish, my dear sister.'

That night, there is an argument between perfect Livia and Emperor Augustus, and she smiles brightly to herself, scaring the slaves. The next afternoon, he reads her texts of philosophical debate for an hour, and she asks how long until the cuts heal.

It must have been the right thing, because his annoyance visibly lessens, as if she's finally doing whatever he thinks the right thing is. He tells her if she'll start eating properly and willingly, he'll allow her to spend more time sitting with her birds.

At first, she involuntarily vomits when she eats a complete meal. He looks at her devoid of emotion and tells her that her body will need time, that she must gradually work her way up to complete meals. It takes a week, but soon, she is eating normally, and though still confined to the room, she is given more freedom to move.

The cuts heal, no scars thanks to the herbs applied, and he tells that next time, she had best go for death because he will not be near as merciful if she embarrasses him in such a way again. Female slaves inspect her body every night for unaccounted for marks.

However, she's Atia's daughter, Julius Caesar's niece, and the older sister of Augustus Caesar. She may be a fool who's unable to understand politics and the motivations behind people's actions, but scheming is in her blood. Marks on the underside of sagging breasts, between her thighs and toes, on her neck behind her hair.

One day, he sits down beside her in the garden, and whatever he is about to say is cut off by his realisation she's not wearing her favourite ring. Grabbing her hand, he examines it until he finds the tiny cut she made between the space between two of her fingers.

Inside, she is stripped bare, and he clinically examines every inch of her body, lifting up her breasts, parting her thighs and buttocks, examining them with his fingers before washing his hands and threading them through her hair, checking every inch of her scalp, inside her ears and mouth and nose, between her toes and the soles of her feet. Once he has found every nick and cut, she is again restrained, this time to her own bed.

Slaves are horribly punished, some sold, others turned black and blue, all denied former privileges.

After two days and two nights, she is released from her bed but confined to her room, a slave always present, everything that could possibly turned into a weapon removed, some of it to be briefly returned when she needs it but only under strict supervision. Every night, he efficiently examines her inch of her body to make sure she didn't manage to find another way.

One day, she curls up in a corner and alternates between weeping and begging the gods for death. The slaves fret, not sure whether to go near her and try to restrain her or briefly leave and get their mistress. When she stops begging and begins taunting the gods, it's hastily decided some will go, and the rest will stay in the room but not come near her unless absolutely necessary.

Livia comes and has them restrain her. Once she is, the simpering little child comes and rubs circles on her forehead until she lashes out, trying to bite. Livia moves away, but she doesn't leave, promising to stay until Augustus arrives. 'His name is Octavian,' she childishly corrects.

It's long after dark when he arrives, coolly ordering Livia and the slaves to leave.

'Explain why you are so unhappy,' he orders, voice neutral. 'You are the second richest person in Rome; you are sister to a demigod. When you aren't being restrained, you have more freedom than most male citizens. Why is pain and possible death the cure to your ills?"

She looks at him with pity and annoyance. Isn't it obvious? She supposes not; when he was little, he'd try to comfort her when she was sad but would always ask 'why?' after she cheered up. He was dismal at comfort, but the fact he tried had usually been enough.

He loved her, then, before she disgusted him by trying to use sex. He allowed it, curious, but once it was done, he never looked at her as anything but an obligation. Her mother loved her, but she's gone. Glabius has been gone for years. Agrippa is in some foreign land, married to some woman, children borne. Antony never loved her, and Antonia died from a raging fever when she was much too young. The twins conceived by Antony and Cleopatra have long returned to Egypt, puppet rulers under their father's brother-in-law.

Slaves are able to find love among themselves; even the poor and sick have friends and family. All she has is a brother who will barely look her in the eyes and a sister-in-law who has all his love. She's gone from a dearest friend to a controllable inconvenience.

While she's trying to think how to explain, he sighs, though it isn't a normal one but a broken sound she hasn't heard since he was a young boy wearing a man's garments. Then, he begins untying her. Standing, she begins to disrobe, thinking that's why he's come, but he reaches over and halts her hand.

'I've tried to fight, sister,' he says, quietly. 'I would do anything to win this battle. It's time to accept, however, that unless you want me to, nothing I do will come close.' He withdraws a sharp knife and sets it down on her bed. Then, her takes out a jar of ink, opens it, dipping his fingers into it, sets it down, and reaches over with his unmarked hand, bringing her wrist under his face. Carefully, he traces a vein on the wrist with ink stained fingers.

Next is a spot on her neck. After ordering her to open her robe, he marks another spot on her stomach, and then, her chest.

Stepping back, he looks her in the eye. 'If you want to continue hurting yourself, don't come near me. If you want death so badly, drink enough to dull your senses but not enough to cause uncoordinated movements; you can figure the correct amount out by yourself. Choose one of the spots marked; with a sharp knife, any of them will bring about a quick, relatively painless death.'

Numb, she stares, noticing in confusion he is shaking slightly. Leaning over, he kisses her on the lips, chastely, like when they were children, and then, he turns and walks out of the room.

Picking up the knife, she studies it in under the lit lamps.

...

In his bed, he and Livia sleep naked. Paying no heed, she reaches over and shakes him, blood dripping onto him from the fresh wound on her arm.

When they wake, Livia gasping and immediately going to get a slave, she says, 'Tell me you love me.'

'I love you,' he says, looking her in the eye, his tone matter-of-fact, no strategy she can see in his face. 'I've always loved you, Octavia. I always will.'

Nodding, rocking back and forth, ignoring the painful cut, she says, 'I can't just stop. It's a battle.'

'Do you wish to win it?'

Slaves come, and her arm is being bandaged, her blood cleaned off her brother. 'I love you,' she says, because it's the unchanging truth. Sometimes, she wishes to win, sometimes, she doesn't, and sometimes, she doesn't care, but she'll always love her little brother.

He and Livia get dressed, the bed's linens replaced, and she's pulled down on it, in between the two. 'Sleep,' he orders. 'The first step has been done. The second will come tomorrow.'

...

She's starting to smile again. Her desire for figs has returned.

Some days, she still ends up having a knife she managed to get a hold of pried away from her, or he finds a new cut in a hidden place. Many days, however, she finds someone and tells them to stop her. Most days, she doesn't cut herself or tell someone to stop her, and he doesn't find any new ones.

Every day, in the garden, he reads aloud, poems of love and philosophy washing over her in his dry voice. She still doesn't understand most of them and finds them boring regardless of her level of understanding, but he enjoys them, and she needs his enjoyment while around her more than almost anything.

...

Author's Notes: I know very little about the psychology behind suicidal intent and self-harm. Please, do not take anything in this fic as a suggestion on how to handle a suicidal and/or self-harming person.


End file.
